The present invention relates in general to receiver sheet supply drawer closure mechanisms in reproduction apparatus, and more particularly to a supply drawer closure mechanism which prevents receiver sheet dishevelment on closure of the supply drawer and accurately locates the supply drawer and a stack of receiver sheets therein.
Modern reproduction apparatus, such as copiers, duplicators, or the like, reproduce information on receiver sheets such as cut sheets of plain paper or transparency material. It is common practice in today's high speed reproduction apparatus to provide a stack of receiver sheets of the desired material in a supply hopper, feeding such sheets one at a time from the supply hopper to a station where the information to be reproduced is formed on such sheets respectively. It is of course well recognized that any misregistration of a receiver sheet at the reproduction station will result in the formation of an unacceptable copy.
A potential root source leading to misregistration of a receiver sheet at the reproduction station is the location of the receiver sheets (and the receiver sheet stack) in the supply hopper. Improper location of receiver sheets in the supply hopper can be caused by the supply hopper itself being improperly positioned within the reproduction apparatus, or by dishevelment (relative displacement sheet-to-sheet) of the receiver sheets within the stack in the supply hopper. Such stack dishevelment may result from the simple action of inserting the supply hopper into the reproduction apparatus. For example, the supply hopper may be in the form of a slidable receiver sheet supply drawer movable to an open location external to the reproduction apparatus to load a stack of receiver sheets and to a closed location internal to the reproduction apparatus where sheets are fed to the reproduction station. If the supply drawer is moved from its external location to its internal location at too rapid a speed, a sudden stop of the supply drawer occurs when the drawer reaches the internal location, and the sheets of the contained stack may be disheveled. Further, with prior receiver sheet supply drawer latch mechanisms, the position of the supply drawer at the closed location internal to the reproduction apparatus may vary. This can result in the receiver sheets within the supply drawer being misregistered when fed to the reproduction station of the reproduction apparatus.